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Saki (H.H. Munro) - "Reginald in Russia and Other Sketches"

Charles Dickens - "Miscellaneous Papers"

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Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions

C >> Charles Mackay >> Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions




Bohmen died in 1624, leaving behind him a considerable number of
admiring disciples. Many of them became, during the seventeenth
century, as distinguished for absurdity as their master; amongst whom
may be mentioned Gifftheil, Wendenhagen, John Jacob Zimmermann, and
Abraham Frankenberg. Their heresy rendered them obnoxious to the
Church of Rome; and many of them suffered long imprisonment and
torture for their faith. One, named Kuhlmann, was burned alive at
Moscow, in 1684, on a charge of sorcery. Bohmen's works were
translated into English, and published, many years afterwards by an
enthusiast, named William Law.

MORMIUS.

Peter Mormius, a notorious alchymist, and contemporary of Bohmen,
endeavoured, in 1630, to introduce the Rosicrucian philosophy into
Holland. He applied to the States-General to grant him a public
audience, that he might explain the tenets of the sect, and disclose a
plan for rendering Holland the happiest and richest country on the
earth, by means of the philosopher's' stone and the service of the
elementary spirits. The States-General wisely resolved to have nothing
to do with him. He thereupon determined to shame them by printing his
book, which he did at Leyden the same year. It was entitled "The Book
of the most Hidden Secrets of Nature," and was divided into three
parts; the first treating of "perpetual motion," the second of the
"transmutation of metals," and the third of the "universal medicine."
He also published some German works upon the Rosicrucian philosophy,
at Frankfort, in 1617.

Poetry and Romance are deeply indebted to the Rosicrucians for
many a graceful creation. The literature of England, France, and
Germany contains hundreds of sweet fictions, whose machinery has been
borrowed from their day-dreams. The "delicate Ariel" of Shakspeare
stands pre-eminent among the number. From the same source Pope drew
the airy tenants of Belinda's dressing-room, in his charming "Rape of
the Lock;" and La Motte Fouque, the beautiful and capricious
water-nymph, Undine, around whom he has thrown more grace and
loveliness, and for whose imaginary woes he has excited more sympathy,
than ever were bestowed on a supernatural being. Sir Walter Scott also
endowed the White Lady of Avenel with many of the attributes of the
undines, or water-sprites. German romance and lyrical poetry teem with
allusions to sylphs, gnomes, undines, and salamanders; and the French
have not been behind in substituting them, in works of fiction, for
the more cumbrous mythology of Greece and Rome. The sylphs, more
especially, have been the favourites of the bards, and have become so
familiar to the popular mind as to be, in a manner, confounded with
that other race of ideal beings, the fairies, who can boast of an
antiquity much more venerable in the annals of superstition. Having
these obligations to the Rosicrucians, no lover of poetry can wish,
however absurd they were, that such a sect of philosophers had never
existed.

BORRI.

Just at the time that Michael Mayer was making known to the world
the existence of such a body as the Rosicrucians, there was born in
Italy a man who was afterwards destined to become the most conspicuous
member of the fraternity. The alchymic mania never called forth the
ingenuity of a more consummate or more successful impostor than Joseph
Francis Borri. He was born in 1616 according to some authorities, and
in 1627 according to others, at Milan; where his father, the Signor
Branda Borri, practised as a physician. At the age of sixteen, Joseph
was sent to finish his education at the Jesuits' College in Rome,
where he distinguished himself by his extraordinary memory. He learned
everything to which he applied himself with the utmost ease. In the
most voluminous works no fact was too minute for his retention, and no
study was so abstruse but that he could master it; but any advantages
he might have derived from this facility, were neutralized by his
ungovernable passions and his love of turmoil and debauchery. He was
involved in continual difficulty, as well with the heads of the
college as with the police of Rome, and acquired so bad a character
that years could not remove it. By the aid of his friends he
established himself as a physician in Rome, and also obtained some
situation in the Pope's household. In one of his fits of studiousness
he grew enamoured of alchymy, and determined to devote his energies to
the discovery of the philosopher's stone. Of unfortunate propensities
he had quite sufficient, besides this, to bring him to poverty. His
pleasures were as expensive as his studies, and both were of a nature
to destroy his health and ruin his fair fame. At the age of
thirty-seven he found that he could not live by the practice of
medicine, and began to look about for some other employment. He
became, in 1653, private secretary to the Marquis di Mirogli, the
minister of the Archduke of Innspruk at the court of Rome. He
continued in this capacity for two years; leading, however, the same
abandoned life as heretofore, frequenting the society of gamesters,
debauchees, and loose women, involving himself in disgraceful street
quarrels, and alienating the patrons who were desirous to befriend
him.

All at once a sudden change was observed in his conduct. The
abandoned rake put on the outward sedateness of a philosopher; the
scoffing sinner proclaimed that he had forsaken his evil ways, and
would live thenceforth a model of virtue. To his friends this
reformation was as pleasing as it was unexpected; and Borri gave
obscure hints that it had been brought about by some miraculous
manifestation of a superior power. He pretended that he held converse
with beneficent spirits; that the secrets of God and nature were
revealed to him; and that he had obtained possession of the
philosopher's stone. Like his predecessor, Jacob Bohmen, he mixed up
religious questions with his philosophical jargon, and took measures
for declaring himself the founder of a new sect. This, at Rome itself,
and in the very palace of the Pope, was a hazardous proceeding; and
Borri just awoke to a sense of it in time to save himself from the
dungeons of the Castle of St. Angelo. He fled to Innspruck, where he
remained about a year, and then returned to his native city of Milan.

The reputation of his great sanctity had gone before him; and he
found many persons ready to attach themselves to his fortunes. All who
were desirous of entering into the new communion took an oath of
poverty, and relinquished their possessions for the general good of
the fraternity. Borri told them that he had received from the
archangel Michael a heavenly sword, upon the hilt of which were
engraven the names of the seven celestial Intelligences. "Whoever
shall refuse," said he, "to enter into my new sheepfold, shall be
destroyed by the papal armies, of whom God has predestined me to be
the chief. To those who follow me, all joy shall be granted. I shall
soon bring my chemical studies to a happy conclusion by the discovery
of the philosopher's stone, and by this means we shall all have as
much gold as we desire. I am assured of the aid of the angelic hosts,
and more especially of the archangel Michael's. When I began to walk
in the way of the spirit, I had a vision of the night, and was assured
by an angelic voice that I should become a prophet. In sign of it I
saw a palm-tree, surrounded with all the glory of Paradise. The angels
come to me whenever I call, and reveal to me all the secrets of the
universe. The sylphs and elementary spirits obey me, and fly to the
uttermost ends of the world to serve me, and those whom I delight to
honour." By force of continually repeating such stories as these,
Borri soon found himself at the head of a very considerable number of
adherents. As he figures in these pages as an alchymist, and not as a
religious sectarian, it will be unnecessary to repeat the doctrines
which he taught with regard to some of the dogmas of the Church of
Rome, and which exposed him to the fierce resentment of the papal
authority. They were to the full as ridiculous as his philosophical
pretensions. As the number of his followers increased, he appears to
have cherished the idea of becoming one day a new Mahomet, and of
founding, in his native city of Milan, a monarchy and religion of
which he should be the king and the prophet. He had taken measures, in
the year 1658, for seizing the guards at all the gates of that city,
and formally declaring himself the monarch of the Milanese. Just as he
thought the plan ripe for execution, it was discovered. Twenty of his
followers were arrested, and he himself managed, with the utmost
difficulty, to escape to the neutral territory of Switzerland, where
the papal displeasure could not reach him.

The trial of his followers commenced forthwith, and the whole of
them were sentenced to various terms of imprisonment. Borri's trial
proceeded in his absence, and lasted for upwards of two years. He was
condemned to death as a heretic and sorcerer in 1661, and was burned
in effigy in Rome by the common hangman.

Borri, in the mean time, lived quietly in Switzerland, indulging
himself in railing at the Inquisition and its proceedings. He
afterwards went to Strasbourg, intending to fix his residence in that
town. He was received with great cordiality, as a man persecuted for
his religious opinions, and withal a great alchymist. He found that
sphere too narrow for his aspiring genius, and retired in the same
year to the more wealthy city of Amsterdam. He there hired a
magnificent house, established an equipage which eclipsed in
brilliancy those of the richest merchants, and assumed the title of
Excellency. Where he got the money to live in this expensive style was
long a secret: the adepts in alchymy easily explained it, after their
fashion. Sensible people were of opinion that be had come by it in a
less wonderful manner; for it was remembered that, among his
unfortunate disciples in Milan, there were many rich men, who, in
conformity with one of the fundamental rules of the sect, had given up
all their earthly wealth into the hands of their founder. In whatever
manner the money was obtained, Borri spent it in Holland with an
unsparing hand, and was looked up to by the people with no little
respect and veneration. He performed several able cures, and increased
his reputation so much that he was vaunted as a prodigy. He continued
diligently the operations of alchymy, and was in daily expectation
that he should succeed in turning the inferior metals into gold. This
hope never abandoned him, even in the worst extremity of his fortunes;
and in his prosperity it led him into the most foolish expenses: but
he could not long continue to live so magnificently upon the funds he
had brought from Italy; and the philosopher's stone, though it
promised all for the wants of the morrow, never brought anything for
the necessities of to-day. He was obliged in a few months to retrench,
by giving up his large house, his gilded coach, and valuable
blood-horses, his liveried domestics, and his luxurious
entertainments. With this diminution of splendour came a diminution of
renown. His cures did not appear so miraculous, when he went out on
foot to perform them, as they had seemed when "his Excellency" had
driven to a poor man's door in his carriage with six horses. He sank
from a prodigy into an ordinary man. His great friends showed him the
cold shoulder, and his humble flatterers carried their incense to some
other shrine. Borri now thought it high time to change his quarters.
With this view he borrowed money wherever he could get it, and
succeeded in obtaining two hundred thousand florins from a merchant,
named De Meer, to aid, as he said, in discovering the water of life.
He also obtained six diamonds, of great value, on pretence that he
could remove the flaws from them without diminishing their weight.
With this booty he stole away secretly by night, and proceeded to
Hamburgh.

On his arrival in that city, he found the celebrated Christina,
the ex-Queen of Sweden. He procured an introduction to her, and
requested her patronage in his endeavour to discover the philosopher's
stone. She gave him some encouragement; but Borri, fearing that the
merchants of Amsterdam, who had connexions in Hamburgh, might expose
his delinquencies if he remained in the latter city, passed over to
Copenhagen, and sought the protection of Frederic III, the King of
Denmark.

This Prince was a firm believer in the transmutation of metals.
Being in want of money, he readily listened to the plans of an
adventurer who had both eloquence and ability to recommend him. He
provided Borri with the means to make experiments, and took a great
interest in the progress of his operations. He expected every month to
possess riches that would buy Peru; and, when he was disappointed,
accepted patiently the excuses of Borri who, upon every failure, was
always ready with some plausible explanation. He became, in time, much
attached to him; and defended him from the jealous attacks of his
courtiers, and the indignation of those who were grieved to see their
monarch the easy dupe of a charlatan. Borri endeavoured, by every
means in his power, to find aliment for this good opinion. His
knowledge of medicine was useful to him in this respect, and often
stood between him and disgrace. He lived six years in this manner at
the court of Frederic; but that monarch dying in 1670, he was left
without a protector.

As he had made more enemies than friends in Copenhagen, and had
nothing to hope from the succeeding sovereign, he sought an asylum in
another country. He went first to Saxony; but met so little
encouragement, and encountered so much danger from the emissaries of
the Inquisition, that he did not remain there many months.
Anticipating nothing but persecution in every country that
acknowledged the spiritual authority of the Pope, he appears to have
taken the resolution to dwell in Turkey, and turn Mussulman. On his
arrival at the Hungarian frontier, on his way to Constantinople, he
was arrested on suspicion of being concerned in the conspiracy of the
Counts Nadasdi and Frangipani, which had just been discovered. In vain
he protested his innocence, and divulged his real name and profession.
He was detained in prison, and a letter despatched to the Emperor
Leopold to know what should be done with him. The star of his fortunes
was on the decline. The letter reached Leopold at an unlucky moment.
The Pope's Nuncio was closeted with his Majesty; and he no sooner
heard the name of Joseph Francis Borri, than he demanded him as a
prisoner of the Holy See. The request was complied with; and Borri,
closely manacled, was sent under an escort of soldiers to the prison
of the Inquisition at Rome. He was too much of an impostor to be
deeply tinged with fanaticism, and was not unwilling to make a public
recantation of his heresies if he could thereby save his life. When
the proposition was made to him, he accepted it with eagerness. His
punishment was to be commuted into the hardly less severe one of
perpetual imprisonment; but he was too happy to escape the clutch of
the executioner at any price, and he made the amende honorable in face
of the assembled multitudes of Rome on the 27th of October 1672. He
was then transferred to the prisons of the Castle of St. Angelo, where
he remained till his death, twenty-three years afterwards. It is said
that, towards the close of his life, considerable indulgence was
granted him; that he was allowed to have a laboratory, and to cheer
the solitude of his dungeon by searching for the philosopher's stone.
Queen Christina, during her residence at Rome, frequently visited the
old man, to converse with him upon chemistry and the doctrines of the
Rosicrucians. She even obtained permission that he should leave his
prison occasionally for a day or two, and reside in her palace, she
being responsible for his return to captivity. She encouraged him to
search for the great secret of the alchymists, and provided him with
money for the purpose. It may well be supposed that Borri benefited
most by this acquaintance, and that Christina got nothing but
experience. It is not sure that she gained even that; for, until her
dying day, she was convinced of the possibility of finding the
philosopher's stone, and ready to assist any adventurer either zealous
or impudent enough to pretend to it.

After Borri had been about eleven years in confinement, a small
volume was published at Cologne, entitled "The Key of the Cabinet of
the Chevalier Joseph Francis Borri; in which are contained many
curious Letters upon Chemistry and other Sciences, written by him;
together with a Memoir of his Life." This book contained a complete
exposition of the Rosicrucian philosophy, and afforded materials to
the Abbe de Villars for his interesting "Count de Gabalis," which
excited so much attention at the close of the seventeenth century.

Borri lingered in the prison of St. Angelo till 1695, when he died
in his eightieth year. Besides "The Key of the Cabinet," written
originally in Copenhagen, in 1666, for the edification of King
Frederic III, he published a work upon alchymy and the secret
sciences, under the title of "The Mission of Romulus to the Romans."

INFERIOR ALCHYMISTS OF THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY.

Besides the pretenders to the philosopher's stone whose lives have
been already narrated, this and the preceding century produced a great
number of writers, who inundated literature with their books upon the
subject. In fact, most of the learned men of that age had some faith
in it. Van Helmont, Borrichius, Kirchen, Boerhaave, and a score of
others, though not professed alchymists, were fond of the science, and
countenanced its professors. Helvetius, the grandfather of the
celebrated philosopher of the same name, asserts that he saw an
inferior metal turned into gold by a stranger, at the Hague, in 1666.
He says that, sitting one day in his study, a man, who was dressed as
a respectable burgher of North Holland, and very modest and simple in
his appearance, called upon him, with the intention of dispelling his
doubts relative to the philosopher's stone. He asked Helvetius if he
thought he should know that rare gem if he saw it. To which Helvetius
replied, that he certainly should not. The burgher immediately drew
from his pocket a small ivory box, containing three pieces of metal,
of the colour of brimstone, and extremely heavy; and assured
Helvetius, that of them he could make as much as twenty tons of gold.
Helvetius informs us, that he examined them very attentively; and
seeing that they were very brittle, he took the opportunity to scrape
off a very small portion with his thumb-nail. He then returned them to
the stranger, with an entreaty that he would perform the process of
transmutation before him. The stranger replied, that he was not
allowed to do so, and went away. After his departure, Helvetius
procured a crucible and a portion of lead, into which, when in a state
of fusion, he threw the stolen grain from the philosopher's stone. He
was disappointed to find that the grain evaporated altogether, leaving
the lead in its original state.

Some weeks afterwards, when he had almost forgotten the subject,
he received another visit from the stranger. He again entreated him to
explain the processes by which he pretended to transmute lead. The
stranger at last consented, and informed him, that one grain was
sufficient; but that it was necessary to envelope it in a ball of wax
before throwing it on the molten metal; otherwise its extreme
volatility would cause it to go off in vapour. They tried the
experiment, and succeeded to their heart's content. Helvetius repeated
the experiment alone, and converted six ounces of lead into very pure
gold.

The fame of this event spread all over the Hague, and all the
notable persons of the town flocked to the study of Helvetius to
convince themselves of the fact. Helvetius performed the experiment
again, in the presence of the Prince of Orange, and several times
afterwards, until he exhausted the whole of the powder he had received
from the stranger, from whom, it is necessary to state, he never
received another visit; nor did he ever discover his name or
condition. In the following year Helvetius published his "Golden
Calf," ["Vitulus Aureus quem Mundus adorat et orat, in quo tractatur
de naturae miraculo transmutandi metalla."--Hagae, 1667.] in which he
detailed the above circumstances.

About the same time, the celebrated Father Kircher published his
"Subterranean World," in which he called the alchymists a congregation
of knaves and impostors, and their science a delusion. He admitted
that he had himself been a diligent labourer in the field, and had
only come to this conclusion after mature consideration and repeated
fruitless experiments. All the alchymists were in arms immediately, to
refute this formidable antagonist. One Solomon de Blauenstein was the
first to grapple with him, and attempted to convict him of wilful
misrepresentation, by recalling to his memory the transmutations by
Sendivogius, before the Emperor Frederic III. and the Elector of
Mayence; all performed within a recent period. Zwelfer and Glauber
also entered into the dispute, and attributed the enmity of Father
Kircher to spite and jealousy against adepts who had been more
successful than himself.

It was also pretended that Gustavus Adolphus transmuted a quantity
of quicksilver into pure gold. The learned Borrichius relates, that he
saw coins which had been struck of this gold; and Lenglet du Fresnoy
deposes to the same circumstance. In the Travels of Monconis the story
is told in the following manner:-- "A merchant of Lubeck, who carried
on but little trade, but who knew how to change lead into very good
gold, gave the King of Sweden a lingot which he had made, weighing, at
least, one hundred pounds. The King immediately caused it to be coined
into ducats; and because he knew positively that its origin was such
as had been stated to him, he had his own arms graven upon the one
side, and emblematical figures of Mercury and Venus on the other. "I,"
continued Monconis, "have one of these ducats in my possession; and
was credibly informed, that, after the death of the Lubeck merchant,
who had never appeared very rich, a sum of no less than one million
seven hundred thousand crowns was found in his coffers." [Voyages de
Monconis, tome ii. p. 379.]

Such stories as these, confidently related by men high in station,
tended to keep up the infatuation of the alchymists in every country
of Europe. It is astonishing to see the number of works which were
written upon the subject during the seventeenth century alone, and the
number of clever men who sacrificed themselves to the delusion.
Gabriel de Castaigne, a monk of the order of St. Francis, attracted so
much notice in the reign of Louis XIII, that that monarch secured him
in his household, and made him his Grand Almoner. He pretended to find
the elixir of life; and Louis expected, by his means, to have enjoyed
the crown for a century. Van Helmont also pretended to have once
performed with success the process of transmuting quicksilver; and
was, in consequence, invited by the Emperor Rudolph II. to fix his
residence at the court of Vienna. Glauber, the inventor of the salts
which still bear his name, and who practised as a physician at
Amsterdam about the middle of the seventeenth century, established a
public school in that city for the study of alchymy, and gave lectures
himself upon the science. John Joachim Becher, of Spire, acquired
great reputation at the same period; and was convinced that much gold
might be made out of flint stones by a peculiar process, and the aid
of that grand and incomprehensible substance, the philosopher's stone.
He made a proposition to the Emperor Leopold of Austria, to aid him
in these experiments; but the hope of success was too remote, and the
present expense too great to tempt that monarch; and he therefore gave
Becher much of his praise, but none of his money. Becher afterwards
tried the States-General of Holland, with no better success.

With regard to the innumerable tricks by which impostors persuaded
the world that they had succeeded in making gold, and of which so many
stories were current about this period, a very satisfactory report was
read by M. Geoffroy, the elder, at the sitting of the Royal Academy of
Sciences, at Paris, on the 15th of April, 1722. As it relates
principally to the alchymic cheats of the sixteenth and seventeenth
centuries, the following abridgment of it may not be out of place in
this portion of our history:-- The instances of successful
transmutation were so numerous, and apparently so well authenticated,
that nothing short of so able an exposure as that of M. Geoffroy could
disabuse the public mind. The trick to which they oftenest had
recourse, was to use a double-bottomed crucible, the under surface
being of iron or copper, and the upper one of wax, painted to resemble
the same metal. Between the two they placed as much gold or silver
dust as was necessary for their purpose. They then put in their lead,
quicksilver, or other ingredients, and placed their pot upon the fire.
Of course, when the experiment was concluded, they never failed to
find a lump of gold at the bottom. The same result was produced in
many other ways. Some of them used a hollow wand, filled with gold or
silver dust, and stopped at the ends with wax or butter. With this
they stirred the boiling metal in their crucibles, taking care to
accompany the operation with many ceremonies, to divert attention from
the real purpose of the manoeuvre. They also drilled holes in lumps of
lead, into which they poured molten gold, and carefully closed the
aperture with the original metal. Sometimes they washed a piece of
gold with quicksilver. When in this state they found no difficulty in
palming it off upon the uninitiated as an inferior metal, and very
easily transmuted it into fine sonorous gold again, with the aid of a
little aquafortis.

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